1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to remote controllers, and in particular to a remote controller capable of macro-controlling to carry out a plurality of remote control operations to one or more remotely controlled devices with a single key operation.
2. Description of the Related Art
In an audio-visual system that is constituted by an audio-visual receiver, a DVD player, a CD player, a display, and such, these remotely controlled devices that constitute the system can be remotely controlled by a remote controller. One such remote controller has a macro-control function. With the macro-control function, it is possible to carry out predetermined remote operations to the remotely controlled devices with a single (or a very few number of times, such as twice in some cases) key operation using the remote controller, and a user can register a desired remote control processing to the remote controller. The macro-control function can carry out macro-control operations such as (a) an all-on operation for turning on power of a plurality of remotely controlled devices at the same time, (b) an all-off operation for turning off power of a plurality of remotely controlled devices at the same time, and (c) a series of operations carried out in order to view and listen to a specific signal source, for example, a DVD (Digital Versatile Disc), of turning on power of an audio-visual receiver, a DVD player, and a display, of switching an input selector of the audio-visual receiver to the DVD player, and of causing the DVD player to carry out a playback operation.
However, many of the remotely controlled devices that are commonly used in these days are designed to use a single power on/off remote control code and carry out a toggle operation of toggling between on and off of power every time when the remote control code is received. The toggle operation refers herein to an operation of toggling through a plurality of control states in rotation every time when the single remote control code is received. In other words, the same remote control code for power-supply control is used for both power-on and power-off, and a remotely controlled device switches the power status alternately between on and off every time when the remote control code for power-supply control is received from the remote controller. When the remote controller carries out an all-off operation to such a remotely controlled device that carries out the toggle operation of power, a remotely controlled device in the power-off state can be adversely turned on.
The above problem can be solved if a remotely controlled device is provided with remote control codes that respectively correspond to all control states. In other words, if a remote control code for power-on and a remote control code for power-off are different, a remotely controlled device in the power-on state maintains the power-on state after receiving the remote control code for power-on, and this does not present any disadvantage. However, assigning an independent remote control code for each control state of a remotely controlled device is not a very down-to-earth idea due to insufficient resources for remote control codes whose code length is limited. In addition, increasing a number of the remote control codes poses a problem such as a possible increase in a number of buttons provided on a remote controller or in a load to a control unit of the remote controller.
Further, in order to macro-control a series of operations such as the operation (c) as described above, the user must previously register, as a macro-control operation, a series of remote operations that the user wishes the remote controller to learn to a macro-control key on the remote controller. At this time, the user must manually carry out a series of key operations that are the same as the macro-control operation that the user wants the remote controller to learn. This makes the registration of the macro-control operation extremely cumbersome for the user. In order to solve this problem, some remote controllers are registered with commonly used macro-control operations previously at the time of manufacturing. However, a use environment in which the user uses an audio-visual system can be different from user to user. Accordingly, in a case in which a previously registered macro-control operation is not suited for the user, a problem still remains that the user must after all manually carry out all of the key operations that are the same as the macro-control operation that the user wants the remote controller to learn, even if the modification is necessary only to apart of the remote operation.